


you can break my bones

by qwanderer



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Derek Feels, F/M, M/M, Underage Kissing, mostly post-s3a, mostly pre-slash, think I transferred part of an s3b scene to this universe, tons of 'em
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-26
Updated: 2015-07-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 04:58:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4422272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He'd been trying, since that night, to remember what it was to be gentle. To have friends, to drink coffee in leisurely company and have conversations that weren't about urgent life-or-death demands. Step by step, slowly, and....</p><p>The kicker of it was, he'd felt so happy, so pleased with himself, when he first reached out to Jennifer, to help her, to give her comfort. He felt like he'd finally made progress. He felt like he could maybe be human again, more than beast.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can break my bones

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Work In Progress](https://archiveofourown.org/works/935296) by [JenNova](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JenNova/pseuds/JenNova). 



> This is honestly as much fic of JenNova's fic Work in Progress as it is fic of Teen Wolf. Pretty much all the events and dialogue are from there, I just spread on a thick layer of Derek feels.
> 
> First Teen Wolf fic for me and there's a lot of s3b to present I haven't seen, so forgive any inaccuracies due to that.

Miss Jennifer Blake - or whatever name she wanted to use - was so concerned about how she looked. What people saw when they looked at her. 

Derek was a werewolf. Derek should have been more concerned with how she smelled, how she touched him. He should have known better than to fall for a pretty face like the one she'd put on. 

The problem was. 

The problem was, he'd forgotten what love was supposed to feel like, if he'd ever known. 

Since Laura.... 

Since Laura, his whole life had been fighting, pushing, clawing to survive. Nothing had been soft or comfortable. And even before that... the fire, and becoming Alpha, had changed his sister so much. And... she knew about Kate. So yes, she loved him, but after that, she'd never quite trusted him. 

You couldn't hide that kind of suspicion, that kind of hesitation, from a werewolf. 

So maybe the problem was that Jennifer had genuinely liked him, and he'd forgotten how it felt to be touched without malice or artifice years and years ago. 

* * *

Stiles was.... 

He had barely a scrap of malice or artifice in his entire body. 

Most of their interactions had consisted of glares, pushes, shoves, mostly Derek shoving Stiles out of the way of whatever danger was visiting them this week. Derek had started to notice that he thought of Stiles differently than that wary, distrustful, closed-off relationship he had with the handful of other allies he'd acquired when he first got a chance to sit down and consider that night in the vet's office, with the saw. 

Stiles had smelled of panic and concern, had clearly hated the task set in front of him, but had been willing to do it to save a life. To save Derek's life. And Derek had not had a second thought about pressing the saw into Stiles's hands and holding out his own arm, his Kate-poisoned wound, to be cut off. 

Because Derek trusted Stiles to do no more damage than was necessary. Because Stiles was, by nature, gentle. 

Abrasive, in his own way, yes, but only enough to make his honesty crystal clear. It made him feel real. Anything else would have felt too good to be true. 

He'd been trying, since that night, to remember what it was to be gentle. To have friends, to drink coffee in leisurely company and have conversations that weren't about urgent life-or-death demands. Step by step, slowly, and.... 

The kicker of it was, he'd felt so happy, so pleased with himself, when he first reached out to Jennifer, to help her, to give her comfort. He felt like he'd finally made progress. He felt like he could maybe be human again, more than beast. 

Finding out that she was just another Kate, it sent him reeling. Would have sent him crashing right back to the bottom of his pit. Except for one thing. 

The memory of Stiles's hand on Derek's shoulder, as Boyd lay dead in front of them. The memory of the mixed smells of their grief. 

Stiles had nothing to gain from that, could not have hid an ulterior motive. There was someone in the world like that. 

* * *

Miss Jennifer Blake, or whatever, had trapped him in an elevator and talked to him about whether he was shallow enough to care which of her faces was real. 

As if Derek doesn't know what it's like to have more than one face. As if Derek didn't know by this point that they were both real. And that was the problem. 

Kate had been beautiful, too, and not just that. She'd believed she was doing right, ridding the world of monsters by any means necessary. Derek didn't care why Jennifer believed in her schemes. He only cared that there were schemes. 

That she wasn't touching Derek just to be touching him. 

Later, she'd held him trapped and hurt him, smelling like rage, and proving that the schemes were always more important than Derek. The memories of Kate torturing him washed over him then, cementing Jennifer's place as another incredible misstep, another way he'd put his pack in danger by getting lost in a lie. 

Isaac yelled at him about it later, asked him how he could have let it happen, asked him why. "Were you lonely?" he asked. 

Maybe. But what was the alternative? 

People hurt each other. That was life. 

Even Stiles had hit him, during this chaotic mess of a conflict. Stiles had found him unconscious in that elevator where Jennifer had left him and sat on him and punched him repeatedly in the face. 

But when Derek stopped to think about that, use it as proof of the inevitability of violence and betrayal, he couldn't. Because the fear, the worry, the concern that Stiles had been radiating then was nothing like Kate, was nothing like Jennifer. 

It was the way his mother smelled when she'd had to break bone to trigger one of them healing. 

Stiles smelled like love. 

(It was probably for the sake of the Sheriff. Stiles had needed Derek to save his father. But still.) 

* * *

Apparently Cora'd been befriending Stiles, because he was always around the place now. It wasn't a bad thing, really, except that things had been strange with Cora since they'd reunited, and even moreso since the Jennifer debacle. Derek wouldn't have blamed anyone for never trusting his judgment ever again, but he didn't want to see what would happen when the ever-open Stiles closed off. 

But Stiles didn't balk at sharing his space, at squeezing his shoulder in that way he had, graceful fingers and gentle force as he leaned over to get a glass from the cupboard (and Derek may have arranged it so Stiles had to put his hand there to keep stable, but then Stiles has never been above a little flailing if a situation makes him uncomfortable). 

Then one day the Thor movie was starting up on the much-debated TV, and his chair was taken, and Stiles was in the middle of the sofa with Cora sprawled over him in a way that screamed "pack." She side-eyed Derek a little as he vacillated in the doorway. 

It was strange to realize that his hesitation was more over Cora than over Stiles, and if she wanted him there.... 

He sat. 

He'd always had a weakness for Loki that maybe had a little too much to do with how much like Uncle Peter he sometimes seemed, but after Siege, and after the fire, it became more about himself, and lately Peter had been more or less playing the role of his own personal Ikol. 

Resurrection, betrayal, getting caught up and making the wrong move over and over again, they all had the potential to hit a little too close to home. But with the warmth of Stiles slumped against him, not seeming to care about anything he'd done, not smelling like fear or even wariness, it seemed okay, and he slowly relaxed. 

The movie was different, it was fun, and the edge of knowing what it was to be a creature hated and hunted, with a life full of lies, just made it more engrossing, not painful, not with Stiles by his side, a human who knew everything he was and still sat carelessly close, comfortable. Trusting. 

* * *

Derek really did want to remember how to live with a pack, not just fight with a pack, and right now Stiles seemed to be making a better go at it than any of the werewolves in Beacon Hills. Stiles invaded his space, brushed against him, made himself at home, and just generally acted like pack, smelled like pack. He didn't have that with anyone else right now, and wasn't sure how to get there. So he just followed Stiles's lead, treated him like pack in return. 

Stiles's room smelled like home. 

When Stiles got there, he was moving like he was walking through taffy and he smelled like Scott and the Sheriff and tears, but he was still welcoming. After a half-shouted conversation with his father, Stiles turned to him, bracing himself for whatever Derek had come here to ask - and admittedly, he'd never come here before just for... company. 

Derek would think it had been a mistake, but the whole room smelled like home. Like pack. And now that he was here, he didn't want to be anywhere else. 

"Your room smells like Cora," he finally realized. He hadn't meant that to be the first thing he said. 

"Are you surprised?" Stiles replied. "She at least has the good manners to use the door." 

He was honestly not sure how that somehow turned into Stiles showing off his physique and Derek agreeing that he'd better lock his windows if he didn't want to have to beat off his suitors with a stick, and Stiles's scent changing to aroused and expression to slightly confused. Probably through some kind of non-linear logic unique to Stiles. But there was nothing awkward about it. And it was so easy to go from there to lying side-by-side on the bed, playing xbox and furiously quoting Star Wars at each other. 

The Sheriff poked his head in after a while and didn't bat an eye at seeing the two of them there, barely smelled wary even after everything, after what he'd learned about what Derek was capable of. 

Derek frowned and looked off into nothing, considering what that meant, until Stiles stood, turned off the xbox, and ventured a "So this was fun." It was the first time tonight he'd looked off-balance. 

Derek shook himself out of his thoughts enough to reply, "Yeah." 

"We should do it again." 

"Yeah." Derek ducked his head, wondering how long Stiles had been waiting for this, waiting for Derek to treat his space like home, the way Cora apparently did, the way Stiles did Derek's. Because what made Stiles nervous was asking him to do it again. Derek was slow to relearn the pack thing, and he knew it. 

Derek wanted Stiles to know that he was comfortable here. 

"Derek - do you - " Stiles began, and Derek looked up. Stiles's face made one of those half-frowns that it did when he was changing directions in mid-stream and wasn't quite sure where he was going to end up, and then he continued, "Are you still lonely?" 

Derek stiffened for a moment, remembering when Isaac had asked about the same thing, half accusation. Isaac might have told Stiles - but no. There was no calculation here. This was just a coincidence. This was just Stiles, open and waiting, eyes wide and heartbeat stuttering and scent running to panic as he watched the reactions on Derek's face. 

"Not as lonely as I was," Derek said, and Stiles relaxed again, and Derek smiled in relief. His brief moment of mistrust hadn't caused any harm. 

Then suddenly Derek was being lifted off the bed and bundled into a hug, tight and warm, the kind he'd nearly forgotten and didn't know how to do right anymore. Stiles just rubbed his back until Derek decided he was allowed to not know how, he was allowed to just hug Stiles. 

He relaxed, let his instincts have some leeway, let his nose find Stiles's shoulder and his arms wrap tightly around Stiles's chest. 

That seemed right, since Stiles went with it, clung right back, and smelled irresistibly of bone-deep contentment. And let him stay like that, breathing against his shoulder, until Derek forgot he'd ever been anywhere else. 

As Derek pulled back and made motions as if to leave, Stiles stopped him, saying, "You should go out the front door. Now that you're all legit and approved." 

The pride in his voice, the happiness, pulled into focus what it meant that the Sheriff had been so accepting of their sitting so close. 

Derek had been accepted into the Stilinski pack. And even if they weren't wolves, it was something. 

* * *

It had reminded him what it was like to have parents. How good it was, what he'd lost in the fire. 

The fire. 

The anniversary was coming up and he'd always spent it with Laura. No matter much crap they'd had to deal with, they always got together at least the once every year. They never left each other alone, not then. 

There was no way he was going to try being around Peter, but Cora.... 

Cora was his little sister, and she'd been just as alone, more alone, since the fire. He decided that he'd try to be her brother, at least once. 

But then the day came, and she and Isaac were holed up together in a little ball of sad werewolf, and Derek didn't think he belonged there, didn't think he was ready to be part of that, not yet. 

Derek... wandered. 

He didn't really think about where he was going, but it was kind of inevitable. There was somewhere he did belong, there was somewhere that was home. 

The Sheriff wasn't there, but Stiles was; he could hear him banging around in the kitchen, music on and the smell of food thickening in the air. 

Derek had said he'd text, but right now he needed to be inside, needed to be in that warm kitchen. He let himself in and folded himself into a kitchen chair, just watching Stiles. 

The teenager jumped when he spotted Derek, adrenaline flooding through him and heart racing, but he began to calm immediately when recognition lit his eyes. "Oh my God," he spat, flailing and letting out his shock. "What the hell are you doing?" 

Derek didn't have an answer, at least not for the larger question, so he answered the smaller version. "I let myself in. Your front door was unlocked." When Stiles swore and spun in that direction, Derek stopped him with a gesture. "I locked up behind me. Shouldn't the Sheriff's son be more careful?" 

Stiles's heartbeat ratcheted back up again, just a little, and his face flooded with embarrassment. "I had other things on my mind." 

"I can smell that," said Derek, because he could, now that he was paying attention; he knew exactly what Stiles was talking about. But Stiles was human, and he needed to be careful. 

"Oh, fuck off," Stiles said in response to his expression. "Like you don't jerk off as soon as Cora's out of the loft." 

It was true that Derek _really couldn't_ throw stones when it came to getting distracted by his dick and leaving his pack's home open to attack. 

Stiles laughed, misinterpreting his expression. "I bet she makes fun of you too. Glad I'm not the only one." 

Well, she did. "She's worse than Laura," Derek volunteered, then stopped cold, not sure when it was that he started to be able to talk about his older sister. 

Stiles pressed his lips together awkwardly, obviously curious but not wanting to push. Finally, he turned back to his cooking. "So. What brings you here?" he asked instead. 

That wasn't really an easier question, so Derek shrugged, then, restlessly trying to escape questions, he stood and began to lurk deeper into the kitchen. Closer to Stiles. 

Stiles launched himself onto the counter, maybe to make room for the pacing werewolf, but he didn't seem to mind surrendering his space. "Well," he said, "if you're going to disrupt my plans to have no plans, you might as well stay for dinner." 

Derek just wanted to be close to him right now, and that opportunity was as good as any. "I could eat," he answered, his restless steps taking him closer to Stiles, but he didn't look at him. Looked at everything but Stiles. Watched the blue ring of flame on the stove. 

He put people in danger. Over and over. How could he reach out? He fought himself, and his hands made fists. 

"C'mere," Stiles said so gently, holding out his arms, then making grabby hands when Derek didn't immediately move into them. 

This was allowed. Stiles was safe. He was honest and ridiculous, and no matter how many times Derek pushed him away, he always came back. Pushing him away didn't keep him out of danger. Stiles wasn't going anywhere, he was pack, and in his arms was where Derek belonged. 

Derek was shaking, his head only held up by the solid warmth of Stiles's chest. He couldn't do anything but curl closer, and then Stiles reached up a hand and laid it across the back of Derek's neck, squeezing gently, then moving it up into his hair. 

There was an old memory, his mother's grip on his scruff, a wolf's reassurance, and that was when the tears began sliding down. 

He'd lost them, yes, but he hadn't lost this feeling. Not forever. 

When he lifted his head, Stiles moved slowly to wipe his face, steadily, like a well-known ritual. Derek stared, wondering how this kid had so much of what had made Derek's mother a great Alpha, even though he was young and human and, most of the time, barely controlled. It was strange, seeing so much of her in him. 

Then Stiles caught his staring gaze and paused, paralyzed, unsure. 

This was where they were different. Stiles could come to a full stop, change direction, change tactics like lightning if he needed to. Derek knew Stiles, and he let his eyes roam the familiar face. 

Stiles wasn't sure if this was welcome. 

That would not stand. 

Derek lifted a hand to cover Stiles's fingers on his face, and leaned into them. Stiles took a deep, relieved breath and continued his ritual. 

Eventually they unfolded from each other and got dinner set up, and while they ate they decided to watch a movie afterwards. While Stiles went upstairs to get a dry shirt, Derek paced slowly in front of the shelf, looking for something. Not something particularly exciting. Something familiar. 

As soon as Stiles walked in, Derek knew he'd chosen right. There was a feeling in the air around them, a hint of sorrow in their scents that was just the right amount for today, not too much or too little. So the movie had meaning for Stiles, too. 

When they settled into the couch, Derek ended up wrapped up in Stiles's arms again, which was exactly right. He wasn't sure exactly what right thing it was - or he wasn't ready to deal with the answer - but it was right. 

Derek normally didn't appreciate talking during movies, but the hints of near-whispered lines that escaped Stiles's mouth as they watched this, that was perfect. 

"Life is pain, Highness - anyone who says differently is selling something." 

Derek had never understood that line as a child, and now he did, all to well. But he was learning how to remember that that wasn't all it was. 

Stiles had brought back so much that Derek had believed he'd lost. 

He reached across his chest to thread his fingers through Stiles's, to remind himself that, just maybe, he could keep it. 

The quiet murmurs continued on and off, Stiles's lips moving in Derek's hair with the slightly changed position. 

"Gently. ...A time like this, and all you can say is 'gently'?... Gently!!" 

A glowing warmth had started in Derek's chest, and he thought of how Stiles, of all people, had taught him to be gentle, and how important it was. 

Stiles fell silent during the credits, only the beat of his heart and the hush of his breath coming to even Derek's ears, and soon those sounds were everything, and Derek's own body matched to it naturally, and he could smell the way their scents were blending, becoming more similar with time spent. 

The way his family had all smelled somewhat the same, before. 

Memories kept coming bubbling up, now that it seemed safe for them. 

"It was my mom's favorite movie. She called Dad 'Buttercup' because she said she saved him from marrying the wrong woman. We never found out what she meant because she always promised she'd tell us when we were old enough. Then they - " 

Stiles was steady under him, arms enclosing him, but Derek needed more for this - it was too big, too much. He reached out until he could hold Stiles's wrist in his fingers, feel his heartbeat as well as hearing it. 

Then he felt Stiles take a deeper breath. 

"Bet you're kind of mad at her about that." 

It was like a bone breaking. 

His whole body suddenly went numb, and he wasn't sure which way was up or if he was breathing. But he did know that Stiles was here, that Stiles's pulse was calm under his fingertips, that Stiles had done this on purpose and wasn't surprised at the effect it was having. He'd done it to start something, and Derek had to trust that it was something that would end up being good. That would, maybe, heal him. 

Stiles kept holding him, kept talking through all of it as only Stiles could. "Before my mom got sick, she used to talk about all the things she was going to tell me when I was older – stories about her and Dad, stories about her family – and all the things she thought we could do together, places we'd go and see. She made so many promises and all – all I could think, when she died and I was alone in that hospital room, was how many promises she'd broken, and I was so mad. First panic attack I had was because I couldn't stop being angry at her. I knew that was wrong." 

It was okay, was what he was saying. It was okay to not be okay. It was okay to not know how to deal with all of it. It was okay to be afraid. 

Derek didn't want to look at him, didn't want to take the risk that Stiles might not mean what it sounded like he meant. But he figured it was another thing, like hearing those words, like pulling out an arrow, where he wouldn't start healing until the shock of it was faced and dealt with. He twisted to look at Stiles. 

Stiles's eyes met his for just long enough, then fell away. "I never really told anyone that before," he said. "I told the therapist Dad sent me to when the attacks got really bad. She said it was normal to be angry like that – that we can't help it, that it was healthy. I still feel bad about it, though." 

They were going through this together, then, but at least Stiles had a set of directions, scant as they were. Stiles was so often the one to know something useful. Derek kept watching him. He couldn't waste this. This was a chance to get things out, even if they had to be ripped out, and start the holes healing. 

"I'm mad at Laura for leaving me. She promised she was going to come back. She left me alone." 

Stiles was looking at him again now, that same kind of way where it seems to hurt to look. "Shit. This is the first time you've been alone since - " 

He wasn't alone, not exactly. Stiles had to know Derek didn't blame anyone. "Cora – I – we're not really ready to be family again. We've changed too much; we need to learn each other again." 

"And you don't want to spend any more time with Peter than you have to." They both smiled. It was funny, even though it wasn't. Stiles shrugged. "I'm happy to be a substitute." 

That was wrong. Derek held onto Stiles, watched him, made sure he had his eyes. "You're not a substitute." He was so much more than a stand-in. Especially not for Laura. He hadn't felt close to someone like this since before, since the fire, but Stiles was more than a stand-in for his parents, for his family. Stiles was something new. Derek had barely realized it himself, but he needed Stiles to know. 

"I - thanks," Stiles said, and then fell silent, eyes huge before he smiled. Derek thought he must have understood. 

Derek sank down, relieved, burying his face in Stiles's neck and letting himself drift, now that the hard work was done. Now he could rest. 

Now he could heal. 

* * *

The thing that was still bothering him, the thing that niggled at Derek every time he thought about defining what they were, was that as a high schooler, Derek had had no idea what he wanted, no clue what love really was. And that had led him to make the biggest mistake of his life. 

Never mind that barely a month ago, he had made exactly the same mistake over again. And this time, it had nearly cost Stiles his father. That didn't change the fact that Stiles was seventeen, and he might have gone hard and cold after everything that had happened to him, but he never wanted to be like Kate (or like Jennifer), pushing a relationship on anyone who didn't fully understand what it would mean. 

Derek had Stiles as pack, as the closest friend he'd ever had, and that was so much more than he could ever have imagined. But Stiles was the one who had taught him to reach for more than what he had. 

It was while they were watching Star Wars: A New Hope on the Stilinskis' sofa that it came to Derek how vastly different this all was from how things had been with Kate, how they'd been with Jennifer. 

Stiles looked, sounded, smelled, utterly and completely relaxed, tangled up in Derek and watching his favorite movies ever. 

Thinking back, Kate had always pushed, always wanted to distract more than to bond. The same, to a lesser extent, had been true of Jennifer. Even as far back as Paige - distraction had been the name of the game, though he had been the one guilty of it. 

Stiles was a champion at distraction, but he always backed off when warned, and so much of the time, he was teaching Derek how to live. How to be gentle, how to respect, when to back off and when to stand your ground. He wasn't the teenager Derek had been. 

And Stiles knew everything, all the reasons Derek was dangerous, all the ways in which he failed to live up to anyone's standards. And it wasn't like Stiles had never seen up close and personal what the consequences of those actions could be. Bodies, blood, up close and personal. Stiles knew the score, had fully read and understood the terms and conditions. And he was here, pressed against Derek, utterly relaxed. 

Suddenly Derek didn't think it was Stiles who had been less than ready for them to move forward. 

Derek decided to relax too, trust his instincts, and take the next step. 

And maybe heal this wound, too.


End file.
